While we’re slightly uncomfortable with the idea of wrapping our hands around something called a “death adder” on a day-to-day basis, peripheral-maker Razer seems to think there’s enough gamers in touch with their dark sides to make its latest corded mouse a hit. Helping the DeathAdder earn its sinister moniker is the so-called 3G infrared sensor at the heart of the mouse, boasting an impressive 1800 dpi resolution, as well as Razer’s trademark 1000 Hz “Ultrapolling” technology and a barely there 1ms response time. To keep all that precision under control, Razer’s outfitted the mouse with rubber-coated buttons up top and some smooth-sliding Teflon feet on the underside — lefties, however, are out of luck, as this one’s tailor made for right-handed use. Look for the DeathAdder to hit just in time for the holidays at a not-unreasonable price of $59.99.

[Via Randomly Accessed, thanks, Steve]
more info
from engadget

Apparently there’s a gaping hole in the handheld GPS market, as it seems a new manufacturer takes its first dive every other week or so, and this time it’s none other than Axion. Diverting its efforts away from those portable DVD players and iPTV gizmos, the firm is unveiling a budget-conscious GPS that pulls double duty as a pedestrian guide when not relaxing on your dash. Boasting a familiar 3.5-inch touchscreen, pre-loaded maps of the US and Canada on its built-in SD card, turn-by-turn guidance, automatic rerouting, and “2D / 3D night maps,” the GEO-632 matched up fairly well with other entry-level offerings already on the market. It also functions as an MP3 player and JPEG viewer when you’re not circling the block, and comes bundled with an in-car mounting system to boot. While the device may not floor anyone in the features department, it can get you where you want to go for just $259.99, which is quite a bit less than the alternatives are demanding for their navigational intelligence.

[Via MobileWhack]
more info
from engadget

There’s nothing like a good upgrade now and then, but when it comes time to throw down for yet another Denon product, your wallet can’t help but cringe. Nevertheless, the firm is upping the ante on its D-F103 digital mini system by adding DAB radio functionality as well as CDDB Gracenote support. Sure, the system still touts the same FM and internet radio reception abilities, support for AAC, MP3, and WMA, and it can rip CD tracks directly to its hard drive, but thankfully Denon figured out that coloring the speakers in the same tone as the device itself was a bright idea. The device is also compatible with the ASD-1R iPod interface, and sports USB connectivity to play tunes from your ultraslim flash drive. Reportedly, users can even add WiFi via an “optional adapter,” but we’re not sure how much this subtle luxury will cost you. For £1,000 ($1,950), you can snap up the full monte — FS-103 HiFi speakers included, or you can forego said drivers for a pair of your own if you’ve only got £850 ($1,658) lying around.

[Via ShinyShiny]
more info
from engadget

With as much AMD fanfare as there was leading up to this release, you’d think they would’ve managed to drum up a bit better showing. After running up against a battery of benchmark tests, AMD’s Quad FX dual CPU platform has been throughly trounced by Intel’s QX6700 2.66GHz processor. While things looks great on paper for AMD, with exciting amounts of bandwidth between the two processors, and dedicated memory for each chip, in practice the Quad FX platform is an utter power hog (double that of the QX6700), and only squeezed by Intel in a handful of tests, while for the most part racking up loss after loss, trailing from 10 to 40 percent behind the Intel’s 65nm quad-core chip. Price is also a concern, since even though AMD is pricing the actual chips aggressively, you’ll still have to spring around $480 for the only motherboard that can handle ‘em, and those 1000W power supplies don’t really come cheap. Of course, AMD does have 65nm chips on the way, which should do better against Intel on a clock-to-clock basis, and Windows Vista will include lots of mult-thread enhancements to “even the playing field,” but there’s still no denying that AMD got spanked in this round, and we don’t suppose Intel will just be sitting around while AMD plays catch up.

[Via ZDNet]

Read – FiringSquad
Read – [H] Enthusiast
Read – TomsHardware
Read – Hot Hardware

From engadget

The SCH-B550 is Samsung’s latest gaming phone, and it’s definitely no slouch. Boasting a 2.5-inch folding LCD display, 2.0-megapixel camera, a 3D graphics chip, Bluetooth, a built-in DMB TV tuner, and TV-out. Pricing and availability have not yet been set. One more picture after the jump.

[via Akihabara]
from techeblog
Continue Reading